


Absolution

by MadameReveuse



Category: 1776 (1972), American Revolution RPF
Genre: Anal Sex, I'm Sorry, M/M, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, discussion of slavery, this is really just two founding fathers going at it, tjeffs is A Sad Mess, well it has a little plot??
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-02
Updated: 2016-04-02
Packaged: 2018-05-30 20:36:17
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,250
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6439549
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MadameReveuse/pseuds/MadameReveuse
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jefferson feels guilty for removing the anti-slavery clause from the declaration. But he's not going to cry in John Adams's arms about it. He is not.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Absolution

John Adams, always bristling with energy like one of Franklin’s lightning rods, was quite surprised to find Thomas in the city tavern, looking down into a half-emptied glass of rum with an expression as if independence had just died a fiery death instead of being adapted.

“Why the long face, man?” he said jauntily, sidling up to Thomas’s table and clapping him on the back, a feat he’d never be able to accomplish if they’d both been standing. It made the Virginian jump a little.

“Mr. Adams” he acknowledged, turning back to his drink as Adams sat down. “Would you like a rum?” He traced the rim of his own glass with his pointer finger.

“Molasses to rum to slaves” he muttered.

“Ah, that’s what’s bothering you?” John pursed his lips in displeasure. The compromise with Rutledge had left a bitter aftertaste. Not unlike the rum. Thomas, personally, found the liquid cloying and unpleasant. Every time he swallowed he was once again reminded why he really preferred wine. He had ordered rum in a fit of dark humor as much as the desire to be very drunk very shortly.

“A setback, yes,” John went on to say. “But that particular fight doesn’t stop here. When we’re done establishing our new nation…then it will continue.”

Thomas sighed, his shoulders slumping. “I’m…not…there might never…” he quickly raised the glass to his lips to prevent a confused jumble of his feelings from emerging.

 

* * *

 

Thomas knew that his fellow congressmen often called him a tombstone, on account of his being silent as the grave. Granted, he was not much of an orator. Speaking up in public made his flesh crawl: the multitude of eyes on him, the fear that he would speak too quietly or trip over his words and make a fool of himself. If he would be remembered by future generations, it would be for his prose and his deeds, not for his speeches.

But that day had found him delivering what, for him, constituted a rant. He hadn’t even noticed the flat of his hand repeatedly hitting the desk. He had known he was doing it, and it hurt, but he’d known that like he knew the moon existed. It had been far away and not relevant.

He had been stooped to Rutledge’s height, bent over the desk, almost in the man’s face, his beliefs just pouring out of his mouth in a way heretofore unknown to him… and Rutledge had shut him up with a single pointed sentence. _You are a practitioner. Are you not._ It had not been a question.

_I have already resolved to release my slaves,_ he had replied, but it had been clear to everyone in congress that he had capitulated. He had sunk back into his seat, all the fight sucked out of him, and then Rutledge had been on a desk, acting like the literal antichrist.

Thomas knew in his very core that slavery was abominable. He also knew that his estate owned over a hundred slaves. No, not _his estate_ owned them, _he_ did. When he was home at Monticello, there was simply no avoiding looking that fact in the eye. He couldn’t not observe his slaves, how hard they worked in his fields, in his house and in his gardens, a downtrodden people, but still possessing of a quaint, quiet dignity. They were always there, were everywhere, somewhat in the periphery, all crisp bows and crisp words:

“Here you are, Mr. Jefferson.”

“Good morning, Mr. Jefferson.”

“There’s a letter for you, Mr. Jefferson.”

They all inhabited the estate together, living back to back, but still it felt like Thomas and his slaves were at home in two different worlds. Sometimes these worlds had to interact, but they did it as briefly as possible and with a measure of discomfort on both sides. To some people, perhaps, this sort of arrangement seemed natural. Some people had their slaves call them _master_. No doubt Rutledge was one of those. No doubt Rutledge was one of these people who felt powerful parading about before those they owned. Thomas did not feel powerful. Looking at the bent backs of the black people toiling away on his plantation fields, he felt repulsed by himself. This state of being was wrong, would always be wrong, and if indeed there was such a thing as a superior being, it was surely looking upon them all with disgust. But maybe, just maybe, Tom’s post-mortem pool of liquid hellfire would be slightly cooler than that of Rutledge, who had still been careening on about the triangle trade as Tom was thinking all this, shifting the blame – unbelievably, infuriatingly – on to John Adams, of all people. And Adams, for the first time in the duration of the debates, had just sat there and taken it.

Thomas would have liked to punch the South Carolinian in the face. John Adams was an honest man, an upright man, a good man who would never own slaves even if he had the means for it. John Adams staunchly defending his declaration, heaping praise onto his work (and Adams wasn’t the type to praise just about anything) made Thomas feel some kind of way. Whenever Adams had demanded he stand up for himself, and called his work things like _a masterful expression of the American mind_ , it had made for a rose-colored feeling in Thomas’s chest, comparable perhaps to what he’d felt on his first rendezvous with Martha, years ago.

Well, Rutledge had demanded the removal of what he called The Offending Passage, or else he would topple independency. The decision, ultimately, had come down to Thomas, who had felt like he was standing on some fork in a road. One way led to standing up for his convictions, and doing so for the rest of his life; it led to keeping the passage that so offended Rutledge, to making good on his promise to free his slaves. It also led to the ruin of his plantation and the end of American independence. The other road, he darkly observed, would lead him to doing things he’d never forgive himself for.

When he’d taken up a quill and erased the passage, he’d felt like signing his name onto a contract with the devil.

When he’d said to Adams that he had written _all of it_ , it was his way of saying sorry. It was his way of saying “I’m not brave like you.”

 

* * *

 

That was one of the things he fought to not say right now, in the tavern, hunched over his drink. People of his height were always hunched.

“I’m sorry, John.”

“I’m scared.”

“I feel like I am standing on the edge of some great precipice, and I will fall and turn into someone like Rutledge.”

“I could have done the right thing but I did not, and now I feel like a moment like this may never come again.”

God, he wanted to say these things. God, he dreaded saying these things.

And there was yet something else. Something about that rose-colored feeling that blossomed in his chest, then in his throat, and made speaking even more difficult than usual whenever John Adams complimented him or so much as looked at him. His Rum Of Existential Dread had rendered him just tipsy enough to want to act on it, preferably before Adams went home to his wife.

He stood up. “Come outside with me.”

Strangely, Adams waited without protest as Thomas paid for his drinks and let himself be all but dragged outside. Onto the street, into a quiet alley. Only then did his mouth catch up.

“Jefferson, what on earth—”

In one fluid movement, Thomas bent down, gripped the sides of John’s face, and kissed him.

It was short and clumsy and way too forceful and when Thomas broke away, John’s face was… scandalized perhaps.

“Oh, _Jefferson_ ” he said, a little out of breath. Was that reproach in his voice? Disappointment? Thomas tried to make himself look a lot more drunk than he really was. In fact, he felt like any trace of alcohol had evaporated from his bloodstream.

“I…I don’t know why I…what has come over me…”

Adams raised a hand to shush him and stepped closer. He had to crane his neck to meet Tom’s eyes, and in his expression burned the fire that had driven John Adams to wrangle a resolution on independence from the claws of all the Rutledges and Dickinsons of this world.

“Your place is closest” he said briefly.

 

* * *

 

“Your limbs,” John said a short while later as he knelt on the bed, “are much too long.”

“You are the first person in existence who has ever told me this” Thomas joked.     

“There’s too much leg in proportion to the rest” John went on as he grasped one of Tom’s naked thighs in each hand. “And all these freckles, good god, man, they’re everywhere.” He bent down to place an open-mouthed kiss on Thomas’s thigh, subsequently getting a mouthful of freckles.

“I cannot prevent the freckling,” Thomas said (a bit breathy sounding), “It happens as soon as a sunray hits me. If you don’t like the look of it, you’re welcome to find your enjoyment elsewhere.”

John’s head came back up as he barked out a little laugh. “No, no, Jefferson.”

“I think you may as well start calling me Thomas.”

“Well, Thomas.”

He liked the sound of his given name from John, so he grabbed him by the front of a shirt he was somehow still wearing and bodily hauled him closer for another kiss. This time it was fervent and very sweet; John Adams was a good man, and maybe his kisses tasted somewhat of absolution.

Meanwhile his hands worried at Adams’s necktie and then, as that was discarded, fluttered down to the buttons of his vest and shirt. Absolution or no, it seemed unfair that Tom should be naked and laid out on his back while Adams had shed nothing but his coat.

Together they got rid of the vest and, with renewed determination, Thomas began to open John’s shirt.

“You might not like what you’re about to see…” John began.

“No, John…”

“As you said, you’re welcome to find your enjoyment elsewhere…”

Thomas growled. “No. Just take. Everything. Off.”

Finally John stepped out of his breeches, and Thomas could find nothing wrong with him. Granted, he hadn’t much time to look because an energetic hand promptly pressed him back down into the mattress and before he could even open his moth to protest, John had again pushed his legs apart and was now, finally, starting to stroke his cock. Tom had been hard for the last thirty minutes, but it felt like hours. He keened. He wanted to get off, and he wanted John to do it. But then John’s fingers slid off, lower, rubbing across his hole in a testing way, making Thomas squirm a little on the bed. Now, he did not know what _that_ felt like. It was a bit unorthodox. He liked it.

He raised his head to look John Adams in the face. “In the name of science,” he said, “do you think it is possible for you to enter your…?”

“Oh yes,” John said promptly. “Are you propositioning…?”

“I am an eager scientist” Thomas breathed.

“Well, then.” Adams raised two fingers, indicating what he was about to do. “Do you have any sort of oil or grease in this place? Because this’ll not do.”

Thomas propped himself up on his elbows and surveyed his messy apartment. He was at a loss for the moment. The closest liquid he could think of was the contents of his inkwell, which seemed… inadvisable. But then he remembered.

“I might have something. Doctor Franklin left something here the other day, implying that I might need it…”

“Franklin did what?!”

“Oh” Thomas said, covering his reddening face with his hands. “Not like that, goodness, he… came in the other day to borrow some books of mine and left a small flask of some sort, indicating I’d be needing the contents of it soon. When I asked about its purpose, he gave me a rather tongue-in-cheek answer and departed.”

“Are you telling me Franklin foretold all this?”

“He said he sensed a tension between us that was bound to erupt. Of course I denied it.”

“Of course. Now where did that flask of his go?”

“You’re willing to trust Franklin?”

“Well, nothing ventured, nothing gained.”

Adams watched with some amusement as Thomas, buck-naked, scoured the apartment for the flask. Finally he found it in a desk drawer and returned to the bed with it. John removed the cork and very carefully poured a few drops of the content onto his fingers.

“It’s some sort of oil… seems completely harmless” he concluded as the liquid failed to etch the skin off his hands. He poured out a more generous amount, making sure to spread it thoroughly.

To see John prepare himself in such a manner and without the slightest hesitation made Thomas wonder: “You seem to know how this is done?”

“I’ve seen it done, yes.”

“You’ve done this to somebody…?”

“Oh, no, I was on the receiving end.” John gave him a rare, genuine grin. “My wife has certain… preferences.”

“Your wife…but…I don’t…how?”

“Oh, well, we purchased an artificial phallus some years back with a type of harness that she puts on…”

“Made of wood? The phallus.”

“Of ivory. What a question to ask… well, Abby likes it, on occasion, says it makes her feel empowered. And we were willing to try some alternatives to…the classic way to go about things. We decided, at our age, that four children are enough.”

Thomas made an acknowledging sound, trying his hardest not to let his thoughts stray to his own situation. Martha had seemed jolly enough when she had visited several weeks prior, but god knew she hadn’t always been that way. They had buried a daughter just a year prior. They kept trying for the happy, large family that John apparently already had, but Martha was so fragile, and one more suddenly empty cradle might just break her. And they asked him why he was quiet.

“Thomas? Where did you go?”

Thomas snapped his head up and saw John still kneeling above him on the bed with his slicked-up fingers. He remembered what was about to happen.

 “Are you completely sure you still want this?” John asked again.

“Completely” Thomas affirmed. For emphasis, he opened his legs even further, arched his back even more, presented himself like a prostitute for John to see that he really, eagerly, _wanted_. And oh did he want. For something to chase the dark thoughts from his head. For John to finally _begin_.

He did squirm when he felt a single digit enter his hole. It was not painful, merely… weird. It was a whole new feeling, to have someone’s finger stuck in a place he’d never thought of sticking a finger into…but it did not feel unpleasant, as it moved and explored, and he soon felt ready for more.

“Put another one in” he requested, already on the edge of pleading.

Two fingers was different, as John now got something of a rhythm started, systemically moving them in and out and scissoring them, no doubt preparing Thomas for what was to come. These movements now brought the slightest of pains but he kept pushing up for more.

Then John’s fingers crooked just so and found a spot that was different, special, that made Thomas melt in bliss into the mattress. Had he been able to concentrate on anything but the sensation coursing through him, Thomas would have caught the flash of a triumphant smile that flitted across John’s features at having found it. He began to steadily massage that sweet spot, coaxing the loudest, most decadent moans from quiet, unassuming Thomas.

When John slid a third digit inside, it only added to the enjoyment. Thomas was quick in getting used to being filled like this, and was craving more of it.

“Would you take four? For science?”

“I would take five.” In that moment, Thomas would have willingly agreed to a proposal to shove the entire Liberty Bell up his ass. He would’ve rolled up the declaration of independence he had so painstakingly written and, without hesitation, put it up his ass if John asked him to.

But John asked no such thing. He removed his fingers, making Thomas gasp at the sudden emptiness, and lined up to slowly, carefully, and with the aid of a lot of the oil, push his red-hard cock in.

At first it was painful, overwhelming, but John was mindful of him, making only slow, deliberate movements, stroking his trembling flanks to calm him, whispering sweet nothings to him, saying that he was doing _so well, just a little more time to get adjusted, the sear will wear off in no time_.

At last, sunk down to the hilt, John stilled. Thomas tried some hesitant movements and, gaining confidence in what hurt and what didn’t, they found between themselves a rhythm. Tom’s moans and John’s labored breathing filled the room, accompanied by the sounds of their bodies meeting, faster, harder, more frenzied. Thomas’s own erection had been mostly neglected between them, and when John started stroking it in time with his thrusts, Thomas knew that he wouldn’t last long. John was slamming into him with abandon, hitting that sensitive spot over and over and this, coupled with the somewhat sloppy strokes John applied to his dick, made Thomas feel wildly overstimulated in a way he’d never felt before. He was vaguely aware that he was uttering all sorts of noises, moans and sobs and nonsensical pleas that he would be ashamed of at any other time and that John responded to with grunts and growls of his own but none of this really mattered. Only the sensations mattered.

When Thomas came with a surprised little sound it was like being overwhelmed, it was like a spring uncoiling and the way he clenched and fluttered around John’s length made John follow suit, spilling deep inside him.

 

Afterwards, Thomas assumed John would leave, but he came to rest with him on the bed, curled against his side, apparently too spent to move much more. Thomas considered wrapping his arms around his small form but for the moment he didn’t feel like moving any of his limbs either. He had to wince whenever he shifted, his nether regions feeling very…strange. Perhaps he’d walk a little funny tomorrow. Perhaps it would hurt some. But he was already hoping to repeat the act, to be filled up by John again, and he asked himself if there would ever be a second time. And…

“How on earth are we going to explain this to our wives?”

 

* * *

 

“You told her _everything_?!”

It was a few days later. Thomas had been immersed in a book when John had come in uninvited and sat down next to him, unfolding a letter from his wife.

“I have no secrets from Abby” John said, putting the letter on the table between them and smoothing it down with his hand.

“And what does she say…?”

“She says to tell you to visit us in Boston.”

Now this could mean a multitude of things, but the way John smiled made Thomas hope they’d be alright.

**Author's Note:**

> On the subject of dead children: Martha would see the death of, I think, two more. In total, TJ lost five of them, seven if you include the two Hemings children who died in infancy and who I'm gonna assume were just as much his as the other four. While, yes, in the musical he's kinda cutesy and it's easy to love him a little, I for one can never forget the man he went on to become. When he was like "I resolved to release my slaves" I uttered this kinda snorting "HAH" noise and then elaborated into the fic you have just read.   
> I mean, not that the smutty bit had anything to do with my righteous indignation. I was referring to the other part.


End file.
